D&D General Does WotC use its own DMG rules?

[EzekielRaiden]

I wouldn't say it's a goal when designing a particular subsystem but which subsystems you include might be driven by profit or expense. Often page count limits what goes into a game which is an aspect of expense.

I have said many, many, many times on this forum that "make money" is not and cannot be a game design goal--there is no part of the game itself that "makes money." Making money is instead a business goal, which is then implemented (very inefficiently) by the choice "make a tabletop game."

Design goals are for things that actually occur within the design of the game, hence the name, "design" goal. A designer certainly wants to wisely choose their game design goals in light of whatever their reason was for choosing to design a game in the first place, but that higher, more abstract reason is not, and cannot ever be, a design goal.

It would be like saying that one of the patterns of rug-weaving is "make money." Preposterous! There is no pattern that is, itself, "make money." However, some patterns will sell better than others. At the running-a-business level it is wise to find out what things people like so that your rugs will sell (=your business will succeed). What that does is set the inputs for the questions of which rug patterns you should consider, and what metrics will be useful for evaluating your options. But it does not make "make money" a pattern you can weave into the rugs.

 

[Emerikol]

Er....that's not what exception-based design is though.

Exception-based design says that X thing is true, unless specifically instructed otherwise. It is not ad-hoc at all.

I don't know what you think ad-hoc means to be honest. When you can create a new power without having to conform it to some system, that is ad-hoc. That is not a bad word.

The difference between the actually exception-based design of 4e and the...I'm not even sure what to call it, design of 3e is that 4e is bottom-up, while 3e is top-down.

I'm not sure I get your use of top down vs bottom up.

I think this is best exemplified by looking at the idea of "good/noble undead." In 4e, such a thing is perfectly simple. Use the normal "undead" creature type, then add a feature on your special "good/noble undead" which modifies the effects. The undead creature type remains unchanged, but a new modifier is layered on top, without changing anything else that depends on that creature type. By comparison, in 3e, a thing like this isn't possible. You have to create a new creature type, "deathless," which starts from the ground up as a good/noble undead powered by positive energy etc., etc.

This is the physics of the universe being related to the rules. If undead are powered by negative energy then it makes sense. Exceptions based will not try to adhere to any system. The system is just assemble the components and they don't have to relate. It's like Star Fleet Battles. You can add a phaser bank and doing so doesn't mean you have to remove photon torpedoes. The only contraint there is space but otherwise it is entirely an exceptions based design. A very popular game.

This is just one emblematic example. There are plenty. For example, 4e makes prolific use of "stat-swap" features, so (for example) Dragon Soul Sorcerers can add their Strength modifier to AC instead of their Dexterity modifier. That's an exception-based design solution to the problem that a character pumping Charisma and Strength will end up much too fragile. Doing an equivalent thing in 3e is a much more painful process, almost always involving some sort of feat, spell, or other bespoke structure that from the jump starts with the problem "fixed." This is how you got, for example, a proliferation of optional base classes that were just "X, but with a different core stat." (I'm reminded of the "Battledancer," for example, which was...very nearly just "monk, but based off Cha rather than Dex.")

I'm probably in the four classes to rule them all camp anyway. I realize that D&D seems intent on making classes their primary way of varying things but I don't need it.

Exception-based design means you build generically-useful baselines, and rely upon them whenever you need them, but you don't limit yourself to them: you build on top of them, as one does with foundations. Whatever the top-down approach from 3e is, it results in having to carefully, carefully hang each new element off of something that can handle it....and all too often there either isn't such a thing, or any choice you could use will have some negative knock-on consequence (often very difficult to predict in advance.)

Again, I'm not entirely sure what you mean by baselines. If you mean you create components, then sure but realize you don't have to use anything reusable to do exceptions based design. That is a decision (a good one probably) but you could design a game were everything were unique.

 

[DEFCON 1]

This seems to ignore the concept of "venting".

If it's ignored, it's usually because the poster doesn't make it plain in their post that all they wish to do is just complain and vent about something one time to get it out of their system and that they already know they aren't actually going to get what they want. If that's it... if that's all they want is to say something like "I don't like this" and that's the end of it... there doesn't tend to be as much response. Because people are at home like "Yeah, all right. You don't like it." and there's nothing really for anyone to post about. It's merely an opinion that the person states up front that it's merely their opinion, and other folks most of the time shrug their shoulders (or try to give a couple helpful ideas that the original poster doesn't respond back to because they don't care about the so-called solutions.)

But when someone posts something like "I don't like this.... what does WotC expect us to do now?" Or "I don't like this... how does this make any sense?" Or "I don't like this... why are the designers not seeing what I'm seeing on how this is an actual problem?"... that's when people will jump right in to explain what they believe WotC expects people to do, how it does makes sense, and why no one else sees the same problem they do. They will answer the question that was posed either implicitly or explicitly in the post. And then the so-called 'venter' will respond back with why those people are actually wrong with their answers (even though the answers are usually completely valid ideas but just not ones the 'venter' wanted to hear)... and then we are off to the races. 200 page thread here we come!

Either that... or the person has just vented the same exact vent 7000 times continuously in 200 different threads, and occasionally they need to be reminded that they are just being repetitive and annoying to the rest of us.

Both are good reasons.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Are you referring to exception-based design when you say "ad-hoc"? Because I absolutely would not do so myself.

With many of them I absolutely would, because too many of them show little sign they show a relationship to other similar elements. This is absolutely endemic to spell design, which is why you see some that are must-haves and others that are considered trap options.

 

[Emerikol]

I have said many, many, many times on this forum that "make money" is not and cannot be a game design goal--there is no part of the game itself that "makes money." Making money is instead a business goal, which is then implemented (very inefficiently) by the choice "make a tabletop game."

Design goals are for things that actually occur within the design of the game, hence the name, "design" goal. A designer certainly wants to wisely choose their game design goals in light of whatever their reason was for choosing to design a game in the first place, but that higher, more abstract reason is not, and cannot ever be, a design goal.

It would be like saying that one of the patterns of rug-weaving is "make money." Preposterous! There is no pattern that is, itself, "make money." However, some patterns will sell better than others. At the running-a-business level it is wise to find out what things people like so that your rugs will sell (=your business will succeed). What that does is set the inputs for the questions of which rug patterns you should consider, and what metrics will be useful for evaluating your options. But it does not make "make money" a pattern you can weave into the rugs.

Well I didn't say "design" goal. And businesses make decisions that impact the design all the time. Why is 3e different than 2e? They thought streamlining the game would make it more appealing and thus make it more sellable. Sales are the bottom line for a business. I'd argue that 5e returning in some odd ways to pre-3e thinking (not all by any means) was a business decision. They thought it would be the way to get more customers. That is always there goal.

It is a fact they could design a very OSR type game for D&D, or a very narrative version like Dungeonworld, or a neotrad game, or whatever. That decision impacts how the game is designed and that decision is a financial one.

Now once you've decided on the overall tenor of your game the smaller design details aren't constantly being impacted by profit. I agree there. But the overarching design was impacted by the profit motive.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I think ad hoc just means no underlying system which is the definition of exceptions based design. You create an element and you figure out if it is workable by play testing. Many things throughout the life of D&D were just arbitrary decisions. Is fly better or equal to fireball? Well it depends. The only version of D&D that tried to be at all systematic was 3e and the burden of monster design nearly drove the WOTC staff to despair.

Yeah, "arbitrary" is a better term than "ad hoc" since the latter implies on-the-fly.

(However comparing "fly" to "fireball" isn't where effect based design goes. Its more like "these two spells do damage, have a rider, and are of X range and area". There's no need for that comparison to be fundamentally arbitrary and a new world every time).

In the end, I doubt any system can really do a great job because every group is different. I had two groups playing at the same time years ago and I could not treat them exactly the same. I had to make encounter difficulty different. One group was highly skilled in terms of player ability and one was not. There are just too many factors to consider. So a rough estimate is good enough for me. I will have to tweak it a lot anyway. In 4e, I was regularly running vastly harder encounters than the rules suggested. And I still honestly struggled to challenge my group.

I don't think having a tool for evaluating encounters prevents adjusting to group. After all, its outputting numbers for that gives you numbers you can play with.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Er....that's not what exception-based design is though.

Exception-based design says that X thing is true, unless specifically instructed otherwise. It is not ad-hoc at all.

Not in the usage I've seen or been using. This is another case of the hobby apparently using the same terms for different things by different people.

 

[Thomas Shey]

If it's ignored, it's usually because the poster doesn't make it plain in their post that all they wish to do is just complain and vent about something one time to get it out of their system and that they already know they aren't actually going to get what they want. If that's it... if that's all they want is to say something like "I don't like this" and that's the end of it... there doesn't tend to be as much response. Because people are at home like "Yeah, all right. You don't like it." and there's nothing really for anyone to post about. It's merely an opinion that the person states up front that it's merely their opinion, and other folks most of the time shrug their shoulders (or try to give a couple helpful ideas that the original poster doesn't respond back to because they don't care about the so-called solutions.)

But when someone posts something like "I don't like this.... what does WotC expect us to do now?" Or "I don't like this... how does this make any sense?" Or "I don't like this... why are the designers not seeing what I'm seeing on how this is an actual problem?"... that's when people will jump right in to explain what they believe WotC expects people to do, how it does makes sense, and why no one else sees the same problem they do. They will answer the question that was posed either implicitly or explicitly in the post. And then the so-called 'venter' will respond back with why those people are actually wrong with their answers (even though the answers are usually completely valid ideas but just not ones the 'venter' wanted to hear)... and then we are off to the races. 200 page thread here we come!

Either that... or the person has just vented the same exact vent 7000 times continuously in 200 different threads, and occasionally they need to be reminded that they are just being repetitive and annoying to the rest of us.

Both are good reasons.

I don't think there's anything about venting that requires one to not have reasons for the thing you have an issue with and to present them. Yes, some people seem baffled by their criteria not being other people's, but some are all too aware those criteria are not common and are bothered by that and are venting about it, too. Its still venting rather than expecting any real outcome.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Well I didn't say "design" goal. And businesses make decisions that impact the design all the time. Why is 3e different than 2e? They thought streamlining the game would make it more appealing and thus make it more sellable. Sales are the bottom line for a business. I'd argue that 5e returning in some odd ways to pre-3e thinking (not all by any means) was a business decision. They thought it would be the way to get more customers. That is always there goal.

It is a fact they could design a very OSR type game for D&D, or a very narrative version like Dungeonworld, or a neotrad game, or whatever. That decision impacts how the game is designed and that decision is a financial one.

Now once you've decided on the overall tenor of your game the smaller design details aren't constantly being impacted by profit. I agree there. But the overarching design was impacted by the profit motive.

I might also put forth the idea that the changes to the game made for both 4E and 5E24 were done so at least in part to make them easier to translate into digital virtual tabletop game form... thus allowing Wizards of the Coast to financially benefit from it if/when they got their VTTs up and running. Didn't work out for 4E, but we're about to see the results soon for 5E24.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I don't think there's anything about venting that requires one to not have reasons for the thing you have an issue with and to present them. Yes, some people seem baffled by their criteria not being other people's, but some are all too aware those criteria are not common and are bothered by that and are venting about it, too. Its still venting rather than expecting any real outcome.

If that's the case... then they shouldn't be surprised that people respond to them, or get annoyed that people disagree with their vents.

No one HAS to vent here. And no one HAS to respond back to people that comment about their vents. But that's part of the game that is posting on a message board. If (general) you don't want response... don't make your posts open-ended or don't bother responding back. Make your vent and then get out while the gettings good.